The Last Romantics
By Tara Conklin
352 pages
Fiona Skinner is a well known 102-year-old poet when she decides to accept an invitation to speak about her work. It has been twenty-five years since she spoke in public and she has never talked about the inspiration for her most famous poem. Tonight she will tell the story…. and thus this novel about family and the ties of siblings begins.What did it make me think about?
This novel is about family- specifically about siblings and the bonds that we share.
Should I read it?
This book was easy to read and the author writes so beautifully.However, about two thirds of the way through the book there is a climax in the action. I felt like after this climactic event the book just wandered on to the end. I did love so much of the writing, “Our mother taught us how to protect ourselves from hurt but not how to determine what might be worth the risk.” I enjoyed the book, but was disappointed that it was not more.
Quote-
”Better was largely irrelevant when it came to mothering because the entire enterprise relies on the presumption that one day, sooner than you thought, your child would become an entirely self -reliant, independent person who made her own decisions. That child wouldn’t necessarily remember the Halloween costumes you made from hand six years running. Or maybe she did, but she resented you for it because she’d wanted store-bought costumes just like all her friends. It didn’t matter how great a mother your tried to be; eventually every child walked off into the world alone.”
